


Winter Blossom

by Batdad (MizGoat)



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Established Finn/Poe, Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Polyamory, THERE WAS ONLY ONE BED
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:27:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27901498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MizGoat/pseuds/Batdad
Summary: Finn hasn’t woken since he took a wound from the dark wizard’s sword, but Poe’s heard a rumor about a healer in the forest who has skills with war wounds. It might be desperate to go on hearsay, but he’s tried everything else.
Relationships: CT-6116 | Kix/Poe Dameron/Finn (Star Wars)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 35
Collections: Star Wars Rare Pairs 2020





	Winter Blossom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheAceApples](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAceApples/gifts).



Although the villagers had said that the healer’s cabin was only a short ways into the forest, the sun had set behind the mountains by the time Poe saw the warm light peeking out from the cabin’s shuttered windows illuminating the path before him. His horse, normally calm and even tempered, had flatly refused to pass the tree line, and Beebee had followed only reluctantly with his tail low and his eyes wide. Without his horse he’d had to carry Finn’s unconscious body on his back, the path had seemed to wind ever uphill, and the winter bare branches of the trees reached into the path and were forever snagging on the edges of their cloaks and surcoats. By the time he reached the front door of the cottage his legs were shaking with the effort of each step and the cold air cut into his lungs with each gasping breath. 

“Hello?” His voice came out quieter and raspier than he had intended so he kicked the door a few times since his hands were too full to knock, and at any rate he was fairly sure his elbows and fingers had frozen in place. Beebee let out a few helpful barks as well, and after what seemed like ages, but was possibly only moments the door swung open and the warmth of the fire within washed over him. He was vaguely aware of a dark haired figure in the doorway before the dam that had been holding his exhaustion at bay broke and his vision went black. 

When he woke he found himself tucked into a narrow bed next to Finn, who had been laid on his stomach. His hands had been bandaged with clean strips of undyed fabric, and his shoulders ached but he was warm and well rested. In the watery grey light of early dawn and the faint red glow of a banked fire he could just make out that the bandages on Finn’s back had been changed as well. 

The cabin was small, consisting of only one room, with the hearth at the cottage’s center. The walls were lined with various flowers and herbs hung to dry, and he spotted both his and Finn’s gambesons, cloaks, and surcoats hung on pegs near the door alongside a third set. Poe had just about enough time to wonder at a healer owning armor, before spotting the man himself asleep in a chair on the far side of the fire. Beebee was doing his best to be an oversized lap dog and had curled up with his head resting on the man’s shoulder. 

The sound of Poe sitting up woke Beebee who in turn woke the sleeping man by springing off his lap to launch himself at Poe. The man stood up with a grunt and walked over to where Beebee was enthusiastically licking Poe’s face. 

“How are your hands?” His voice was gentle with an accent that Poe couldn’t quite place. 

“They itch,” Poe answered honestly. Now that he was closer Poe could see that he was younger than he had expected. His short cropped hair and beard were both solidly black, and there was the edge of a tattoo peeking out from his hairline. 

“Chilblains do that. Try not to scratch. It’ll only make them worse.” He had picked up one of Poe's hands and was checking the bandage, so Poe took the opportunity to further examine his face. High cheekbones, square jaw, handsome, Poe realized with a start. He had expected a wizened old hermit, and found himself instead in the care of an exceptionally good looking, well groomed man. His hands too were calloused but clean, and he was gentle as he turned Poe’s hand over to look at the palm. Well at least there was one thing in this forest that wasn’t cursed and miserable. 

Apparently satisfied with the bandages, he dropped Poe’s hand and headed back to the center of the room. 

“Let me get the fire back up and start some breakfast. In the meantime you can explain to me why you’re here. You have a name?” The question caught Poe off guard. It wasn’t a sarcastic rebuke to his failure to introduce himself, but a genuine inquiry that was leaving room for the answer to be no. Poe thought of Finn’s strange set of letters and numbers when they had first met and the third gambeson by the door. 

“I’m Poe Dameron, and he’s Finn. And we’re here because he was wounded by a dark wizard’s sword and hasn’t woken since, and the wound won’t heal. The villagers down by the river seemed to think you might know what to do, and I’m out of ideas so I figured it was worth a shot.” Poe spread his hands wide as he finished. 

“Well, you’re in luck. I do know how to treat that wound.”

“You do?” Poe jumped up and rushed forward. 

“Sit. Yes. I’ll need you to get the final ingredient for me, but yes. After breakfast. I’m Kix by the way.”

And so Poe sat on the edge of the bed and listened as Kix explained that the dark wizard’s sword had left a curse in the wound. He could make a poultice to draw it out, but it would require a flower that bloomed even in winter. They ate porridge at a little table cluttered with herbs and clay jars as Kix drew him a map on a piece of birch bark so he would know where to find it. 

“I owe you,” he said as he held Finn’s shoulders so that Kix could change his bandages. 

“That he was willing to fight with a dark wizard lets me know he is worthy of the help. You don’t owe me anything.” Kix’s hands moved with practiced ease over Finn’s skin, and Poe was struck with the incorrigible thought that if circumstances were less dire, he would very much enjoy watching Kix run his hands over Finn’s back.

“One last thing,” Kix told him as he bundled back up to head out into the cold once more. “Once you pick the flower I need you to focus on your best memories of Finn. The times you were happy together. Don’t think about how you are worried about him, or afraid to lose him. Think about what you like best about being with him, about loving him.”

“What?” Poe flinched. He hadn’t mentioned anything about love. His relationship with Finn was still something new and it felt a little soon to place such a heady word on it. 

“You carried him on your back halfway up a mountain, on the off chance he might get healed. You care, and you’re willing to go a bit on faith. Trust me on this. Think about the best parts of him as you carry the flower. It’s important. That curse is full of fear and anger and pain. I need something to counteract that.” Kix looked straight into Poe’s eyes and his breath caught in his throat, so he just nodded in response instead. 

In truth, the flower hadn’t been as hard to find as he had feared. It had taken half the day, and the forest seemed as cold and hostile as it had been coming to the cabin, but Kix’s map had been accurate and easy to follow to a meadow full of tiny white blossoms poking through the snow. 

He picked them thinking of the way Finn’s jaw looked when it was set in fierce determination, and as he began to walk back he thought of his giddy laughter as they had escaped from the First Order’s fortress together. When trees tried to snag his cloak, he thought of seeing Finn after they had been separated, alive and well and wearing his surcoat. When the wind cut through his clothes he thought of how it felt to hold Finn in his arms, and of the sweet stolen kisses in the armory before they had once again separated. This time on purpose for Finn to lead the sappers while Poe rode with the chevaliers. And as the cabin came back into view in the twilight he found himself once more thinking of watching Kix run his hands over Finn’s back and the quiet trust of that moment that Finn would survive this. 

No sooner had Poe come in the door than Kix snatched the flowers and tossed them in his mortar. Poe let out an indignant squawk at seeing the flowers he had so carefully carried crushed so brutally under the pestle, but Kix merely rolled his eyes. 

“Come help me get this on his wounds where it can do some good.”

Maybe it was Poe’s imagination but it seemed to him that as they packed the ointment into the slash marks the blackened skin at the edges seeed to soften and take back some of its normal healthy brown hue. 

“Now what?” He asked as they set Finn back to lay on his stomach. 

“Now we wait.”

“That’s it? There’s nothing else to do?” 

“Well you could kiss him.” The corners of Kix’s mouth curled up slightly as he turned to face Poe.

“Would that help?” Poe’s voice caught in his throat. 

“Probably not. It just seemed like something you wanted to do.” Kix’s faint smile widened. 

“Oh. Oh ha ha. Very funny.” But Kix laughed in earnest and Poe found he couldn’t be genuinely upset with Finn finally on the mend. And before he fell asleep once more he did turn to place a quick peck on Finn’s cheek. For luck. 

Poe woke to the feeling of lips pressed against his forehead, and opened his eyes to find Finn grinning down at him. 

“Rise and shine sleeping beauty.”

“You…” Poe spluttered, as if Finn had any room to comment on his sleep, but indignation gave way to concern. “How are you feeling.”

“Good. A bit weak, but good.”

“He’ll be strong enough to travel soon, but I’d feel a lot better if you two spent another night here before you headed out.”

And so they spent the day sitting around the central fire pit, as Beebee wove a path between them begging for food scraps and pets. If Poe had hesitated to pry into Kix’s life out of politeness, Finn didn’t seem to have the same compunction. Through some means invisible to Poe, Finn had sussed out that Kix was a fellow infantryman and banked freely on that shared connection to draw his life’s story out of him. 

Kix had been a soldier and a field medic in the Grand Army of the Republic back when wizard knights brandishing magic swords hadn’t been such an unusual sight on the battlefield. He was in fact one of the cauldron born soldiers from the isle of Kamino. When Finn and Poe had tried to protest that he wasn’t old enough for that to be true he silenced them with a hand gesture. A wizard had trapped him in a stone spell when he had learned of the horrible geas that had been placed upon them and the ship that was transporting him had run afoul on a reef in a storm. By the time some pirates had found him and freed him from the spell decades had passed, the dread geas fulfilled, and everyone he knew was long dead.

“I traveled with the pirates a while, but I needed some space to think and I wasn’t going to get that with them. So I put ashore here after hearing about the magical properties of this forest. The cabin was already waiting for me. I’m not sure who it belonged to before, but it was empty when I found it…” Kix trailed off, and they were silent a while because what condolence could be offered to such grief. Beebee broke the moment by licking Kix’s fingers until he laughed and patted the dog’s head. 

After that it seemed only fair to offer their own story in return. Kix was suitably horrified that Finn had been stolen from his parents to be raised a soldier, which was apparently very different from being born from a magic cauldron for the specific purpose of being a soldier. And when Poe spoke of his own parents he confessed his worry that the war they had been fighting for generations would never truly end. An odd thing to tell someone he had known such a short time, but it felt natural to confide in him. And Kix offered no platitudes nor false reassurances, but simply nodded his head in understanding.

Poe wanted to kiss him. And if he was reading things right, so did Finn. Both of them had been leaning in to his touches when he checked their bandages, and vying for ways to coax forth his gentle laughter all day. Their eyes met and with the same mutual understanding of purpose that had guided them to escape the First Order stronghold together they stood and moved toward Kix’s chair. 

“We really can’t keep forcing you out of your bed at night.” Poe grabbed Kix’s elbow and gently pulled him up.

“It’s no bother,” Kix started to say, but Finn cut him off, standing behind him and boxing him in.

“It bothers us.” Finn all but whispered low against Kix’s ear. 

They all three turned and glanced at the bed. 

“I’m not sure we’ll all fit,” Kix said with only the faintest hint of trepidation. 

“No way to know unless we try.” Poe grinned and Kix shook his head but let himself be led to the bed anyway. 

In the end Poe got what he wanted and more beside, and as it turned out they did all fit on the bed in the boneless aftermath of spent desire.

The following morning Poe found himself lagging as he dressed to head out. On one hand he knew he had no business asking Kix to get back into the mess and heartache of war after he had managed to leave it behind, and yet leaving him here to mourn alone felt even worse. 

“Come with us.” Poe rushed the words out before he could regret saying them. “Healers of any kind are hard enough to come by, combat medics are all but impossible. We could use your help.”

Kix’s eyebrows shot up and his mouth parted in surprise but nothing came out.

“And we like you. Which is the more important part,” Finn added while shooting Poe a look to curdle milk.

“Oh yes. That too. Of course,” Poe added hastily. 

“Oh well in that case.” Kix shook his head. “I suppose someone ought to make sure that Finn doesn’t reopen those wounds after all the trouble we went through to heal them.”

As the three of them came back down through the tree line toward the riverside town with Beebee bounding ahead of them, Poe got the distinct impression that if they tried to head back the cabin would have disappeared. But that was all right. They hadn’t left anything behind.


End file.
